Another WaPo Columnist Bites the Dust

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Ruth Marcus is leaving the Washington Post. 

What a loss. What a loss. 

Marcus is one of the many liberal columnists at the Post who are upset at Jeff Bezos’ decision to move the paper’s Opinion Page in a more liberty-friendly direction, promoting free market ideas and personal liberty rather than the soft-socialism usually found on the pages of the Post. 

In one way I applaud Marcus for taking a stand for principle; in another, I am inclined to roll my eyes. As a 66-year-old she is a spring chicken by Washington standards, hardly eligible by age to become a junior Senator. Her mental decline has not begun, and her income potential is likely enhanced by taking a cost-free stand for principle. 

Still, her gig as Deputy Editorial Page Editor at one of the most prestigious, if declining, newspapers was a really nice gig that most journalists would happily give a body part for. So minor kudos, I guess. 

Marcus is leaving because the Editor spiked a column in which she took on Bezos’ diktat that the paper was moving libertyward. It is no surprise that promoting liberty is anathema to her, and that she cannot abide having her words appear next to anybody who doesn’t agree with her. 

A top political columnist for The Washington Post resigned today, accusing Post chief executive and publisher Will Lewis of killing her column that criticized owner Jeff Bezos’s drive to overhaul the opinion pages to focus on his libertarian priorities.

Post columnist and Associate Editor Ruth Marcus, who has worked at the paper for four decades, says she can no longer stay there.

“Jeff’s announcement that the opinion section will henceforth not publish views that deviate from the pillars of individual liberties and free markets threatens to break the trust of readers that columnists are writing what they believe, not what the owner has deemed acceptable,” Marcus wrote in a resignation letter obtained by NPR.

Perhaps she thinks that there is a dearth of newspapers with leftward-leaning voices, so the loss of the Washington Post’s voice will leave a void in the market for Deep State voices. 

I would be a bit more sympathetic if we didn’t live in a world where journalists go on strikes whenever a conservative voice is allowed in the newspaper. When journalists scream “Nazi” and “fascist” whenever a Republican other than Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger speak I would be inclined to discuss intellectual diversity with them. But given their penchant for censoring others it is hard to take them seriously on any topic. 

Marcus has been at the newspaper for 40 years, which is a pretty good run for just about anyone except people who believe that being a member of the transnational elite entitles one to a sinecure, deference in all things, and the right to silence all opposition. Complaining when the shoe is on the other foot is a bit rich. 

As for the “intellectual diversity” argument, in principle it is an argument with which I have more than a little sympathy. But in today’s information environment, nobody is restricted to reading their local paper, every paper has an ideological voice and the WaPo can have whatever voice it wants–it was relentlessly liberal for decades, and Marcus was thrilled with that state of affairs, and there is little intellectual diversity in the Pravda Media to begin with. 

A paper dedicated to free market and liberty is almost unique; only The Wall Street Journal fits that bill, while every large media outlet aside from them is socialist or socialist adjacent. 

Not to mention that attacking your boss is rarely a good career move, which suggests that Ruth waited until she had a replacement for her current gig. After all, it has been quite a while since Bezos announced his shift in focus. As with that now-forgotten witch Jen What’shernameagain, Marcus likely bided her time until she had developed an alternate income stream and then suddenly discovered her principles. 

That is pure speculation on my part, of course. It is perhaps possible that she was happy to remain at the Post if she had more editorial freedom. I could be excessively cynical. 

But probably not.